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<h1>Form testing documentation</h1>
This page...
<ul>
	<li>Changing form values and successfully <a href="#submit">Submitting
	a simple form</a></li>
	<li>Handling <a href="#multiple">widgets with multiple values</a>
	by setting lists.</li>
	<li><a href="#raw">Raw posting</a> when you don't have a button to
	click.</li>
</ul>
<div class="content">
<p><a class="target" name="submit">
<h2>Submitting a simple form</h2>
</a></p>
<p>When a page is fetched by the <span class="new_code">WebTestCase</span>
using <span class="new_code">get()</span> or <span class="new_code">post()</span>
the page content is automatically parsed. This results in any form
controls that are inside &lt;form&gt; tags being available from within
the test case. For example, if we have this snippet of HTML...
<pre>
&lt;form&gt;
    &lt;input type="text" name="a" value="A default" /&gt;
    &lt;input type="submit" value="Go" /&gt;
&lt;/form&gt;
</pre> Which looks like this...
</p>
<p>
<form class="demo"><input type="text" name="a" value="A default">
<input type="submit" value="Go"></form>
</p>
<p>We can navigate to this code, via the <a
	href="http://www.lastcraft.com/form_testing_documentation.php">LastCraft</a>
site, with the following test...
<pre>
class SimpleFormTests extends WebTestCase {
    <strong>
    function testDefaultValue() {
        $this-&gt;get('http://www.lastcraft.com/form_testing_documentation.php');
        $this-&gt;assertField('a', 'A default');
    }</strong>
}
</pre> Immediately after loading the page all of the HTML controls are set at
their default values just as they would appear in the web browser. The
assertion tests that a HTML widget exists in the page with the name "a"
and that it is currently set to the value "A default". As usual, we
could use a pattern expectation instead if a fixed string.
</p>
<p>We could submit the form straight away, but first we'll change
the value of the text field and only then submit it...
<pre>
class SimpleFormTests extends WebTestCase {

    function testDefaultValue() {
        $this-&gt;get('http://www.my-site.com/');
        $this-&gt;assertField('a', 'A default');<strong>
        $this-&gt;setField('a', 'New value');
        $this-&gt;click('Go');</strong>
    }
}
</pre> Because we didn't specify a method attribute on the form tag, and
didn't specify an action either, the test case will follow the usual
browser behaviour of submitting the form data as a <em>GET</em> request
back to the same location. SimpleTest tries to emulate typical browser
behaviour as much as possible, rather than attempting to catch missing
attributes on tags. This is because the target of the testing framework
is the PHP application logic, not syntax or other errors in the HTML
code. For HTML errors, other tools such as <a
	href="http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/tidy/">HTMLTidy</a> should be
used.
</p>
<p>If a field is not present in any form, or if an option is
unavailable, then <span class="new_code">WebTestCase::setField()</span>
will return <span class="new_code">false</span>. For example, suppose we
wish to verify that a "Superuser" option is not present in this form...

<pre>
&lt;strong&gt;Select type of user to add:&lt;/strong&gt;
&lt;select name="type"&gt;
    &lt;option&gt;Subscriber&lt;/option&gt;
    &lt;option&gt;Author&lt;/option&gt;
    &lt;option&gt;Administrator&lt;/option&gt;
&lt;/select&gt;
</pre> Which looks like...
</p>
<p>
<form class="demo"><strong>Select type of user to add:</strong> <select
	name="type">
	<option>Subscriber</option>
	<option>Author</option>
	<option>Administrator</option>
</select></form>
</p>
<p>The following test will confirm it...
<pre>
class SimpleFormTests extends WebTestCase {
    ...
    function testNoSuperuserChoiceAvailable() {<strong>
        $this-&gt;get('http://www.lastcraft.com/form_testing_documentation.php');
        $this-&gt;assertFalse($this-&gt;setField('type', 'Superuser'));</strong>
    }
}
</pre> The selection will not be changed on a failure to set a widget value.
</p>
<p>Here is the full list of widgets currently supported...
<ul>
	<li>Text fields, including hidden and password fields.</li>
	<li>Submit buttons including the button tag, although not yet
	reset buttons</li>
	<li>Text area. This includes text wrapping behaviour.</li>
	<li>Checkboxes, including multiple checkboxes in the same form.</li>
	<li>Drop down selections, including multiple selects.</li>
	<li>Radio buttons.</li>
	<li>Images.</li>
</ul>
</p>
<p>Although most standard HTML widgets are catered for by <em>SimpleTest</em>'s
built in parser, it is unlikely that JavaScript will be implemented
anytime soon.</p>

<p><a class="target" name="multiple">
<h2>Fields with multiple values</h2>
</a></p>
<p>SimpleTest can cope with two types of multivalue controls:
Multiple selection drop downs, and multiple checkboxes with the same
name within a form. The multivalue nature of these means that setting
and testing are slightly different. Using checkboxes as an example...
<pre>
&lt;form class="demo"&gt;
    &lt;strong&gt;Create privileges allowed:&lt;/strong&gt;
    &lt;input type="checkbox" name="crud" value="c" checked&gt;&lt;br&gt;
    &lt;strong&gt;Retrieve privileges allowed:&lt;/strong&gt;
    &lt;input type="checkbox" name="crud" value="r" checked&gt;&lt;br&gt;
    &lt;strong&gt;Update privileges allowed:&lt;/strong&gt;
    &lt;input type="checkbox" name="crud" value="u" checked&gt;&lt;br&gt;
    &lt;strong&gt;Destroy privileges allowed:&lt;/strong&gt;
    &lt;input type="checkbox" name="crud" value="d" checked&gt;&lt;br&gt;
    &lt;input type="submit" value="Enable Privileges"&gt;
&lt;/form&gt;
</pre> Which renders as...
</p>
<p>
<form class="demo"><strong>Create privileges allowed:</strong> <input
	type="checkbox" name="crud" value="c" checked> <br>
<strong>Retrieve privileges allowed:</strong> <input type="checkbox"
	name="crud" value="r" checked> <br>
<strong>Update privileges allowed:</strong> <input type="checkbox"
	name="crud" value="u" checked> <br>
<strong>Destroy privileges allowed:</strong> <input type="checkbox"
	name="crud" value="d" checked> <br>
<input type="submit" value="Enable Privileges"></form>
</p>
<p>If we wish to disable all but the retrieval privileges and submit
this information we can do it like this...
<pre>
class SimpleFormTests extends WebTestCase {
    ...<strong>
    function testDisableNastyPrivileges() {
        $this-&gt;get('http://www.lastcraft.com/form_testing_documentation.php');
        $this-&gt;assertField('crud', array('c', 'r', 'u', 'd'));
        $this-&gt;setField('crud', array('r'));
        $this-&gt;click('Enable Privileges');
    }</strong>
}
</pre> Instead of setting the field to a single value, we give it a list of
values. We do the same when testing expected values. We can then write
other test code to confirm the effect of this, perhaps by logging in as
that user and attempting an update.
</p>
<p><a class="target" name="raw">
<h2>Raw posting</h2>
</a></p>
<p>If you want to test a form handler, but have not yet written or
do not have access to the form itself, you can create a form submission
by hand.
<pre>
class SimpleFormTests extends WebTestCase {
    ...<strong>    
    function testAttemptedHack() {
        $this-&gt;post(
                'http://www.my-site.com/add_user.php',
                array('type' =&gt; 'superuser'));
        $this-&gt;assertNoText('user created');
    }</strong>
}
</pre> By adding data to the <span class="new_code">WebTestCase::post()</span>
method, we are attempting to fetch the page as a form submission.
</p>

</div>
References and related information...
<ul>
	<li>SimpleTest project page on <a
		href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/simpletest/">SourceForge</a>.</li>
	<li>SimpleTest download page on <a
		href="http://www.lastcraft.com/simple_test.php">LastCraft</a>.</li>
	<li>The <a href="http://simpletest.sourceforge.net/">developer's
	API for SimpleTest</a> gives full detail on the classes and assertions
	available.</li>
</ul>
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<div class="copyright">Copyright<br>
Marcus Baker 2006</div>
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